Reality TV Comes to Collingswood [UPDATE]

The scaffolding set up around DiBartolo Bakery isn't just for construction, as the Collingswood mainstay's Facebook page would suggest. The Food Network is also filming a reality show there.

Owner Mike DiBartolo said his 44-year-old bakery called in a high-profile consultant to help update the recipes and look of his Haddon Avenue mainstay location.

"They’re doing a makeover on the store," DiBartolo told Patch. "They’re upgrading the whole front, changing the façade outside and changing the inside to give us a new look."

DiBartolo said he was "nervous [and] excited" about the process.

"Although we’ve been around for 44 years, you’ve got to move up for the times, you’ve got to get young people," he said. "You’ve got to get hip, you’ve got to get with it. There’s things that you can change on your old recipes to get excited."

DiBartolo said that with a number of niche bakeries popping up (and sometimes disappearing) in the area, "Everybody's looking for something special.

"We’ve always been tried and true, been doing this forever," he said. 

Film crews were busy shooting footage Sunday and Monday in Collingswood, drawing onlookers and Haddon Avenue rubberneckers, but production is hush-hush. A big reveal of the updated facility is expected sometime this week.

In the grand tradition of reality television, the crew shot the same sequence several times Monday morning outside of the bakery. Orange cones marked off the set, with several parking spaces blocked off outside of the bakery and Saladworks and the end of Lincoln Avenue cordoned off. 

This isn't the first time film crews have turned their cameras toward Collingswood. Bobby Flay filmed at the Pop Shop for a grilled cheese Throwdown! with Bobby Flay episode in 2008.

Geisinger Health Plan, a Pennsylvania-based insurance carrier, also shot a commercial throughout the borough last summer, and Kitchen Consigliere owner Angelo Lutz has been pitching a series that trades on his colorful personal history.

Check out the clip above for a snippet of the action and check back with Collingswood Patch for more information.

Update, March 7: Check out the new look at DiBartolo Bakery Drops Curtain on New Look.

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